Posted
by
timothy
on Friday September 17, 2010 @05:04AM
from the walk-me-to-the-store dept.

kkleiner writes "Honda has created two walking exoskeletons based on Asimo research that assist humans in walking. The Bodyweight Support Assist exoskeleton is a set of thin legs attached to a seat. Users sit on the seat and slip their feet into shoes on the robotic legs. This system supports bodyweight to assist people in walking and moving up and down steps. The other, Stride Management Assist, is a brace worn around the hips and thighs that provides added strength when flexing that joint. It's currently under development and being tested by 130 patients in the field. Both devices may prove to be valuable tools in helping the elderly maintain their mobility, assisting the disabled, and easing the stress on physical laborers."

quote from one of the videos: "no jumping". obviously, the things are based on moving within some strict parameters.however, I think they can be constructed so that it's easy to get out of them (if you need them). until they have the direct to brain interface available...

Is there any reason why the exoskeleton should have any vulnerabilities to viruses? I can't see a reason you'd put a USB port, an optical drive, or Internet access on one of these. I mean, I suppose you could somehow flash the virus into the circuitry, if you had that kind of access to it, but for an end user product, how likely is that?

With more and more devices allowing and requiring firmware updates, it wouldn't be so surprising to have to hook up these legs to a computer occasionally to upgrade the control software. This would leave it open to attack in many ways. Many people who bought the movie Avatar complained about the need for a firmware update just to watch the movie, when you have software controlling your leg movement (or assisting, whatever) what is to say that there won't be bug fixes, or even modifications to the software for a persons personal leg gait.